Category Archives: Family

Catching Up: Busy Girl Edition

Posted on by

So what have I been up to? Well…

Crocheting. My happy thing these days is to crochet while watching YouTube in the evening. So far this year, I’ve finished prayer shawls, 2 NICU blankets (including one with the frogged yarn from another blanket), and I’m almost done with another prayer shawl.

Health. I’ve been dealing with serious fatigue, which my psych nurse thinks is the depressive phase of bipolar 2. Oh freaking joy… Daniel has also been adding stress to my life, so that isn’t helping.

Politics. I’ve been writing postcards for my local Democrats and Activate America to help get out the vote in Ohio, Arizona, Montana, and here in Washington. It doesn’t feel like a lot, but it’s something that needs to be done and I have a lot of spare time.

Catching Up: COVID Edition

Posted on by

It was a nice 3 1/2 years avoiding COVID…

[+] After masking up, quarantining, and getting vaccinated, my turn for COVID finally came. I likely got it from Dad, who got it at a small family gathering. I knew I’d probably get it if someone in the house got it–my immune system is crappy. The test showed the COVID line almost immediately, and was brilliant red.

[+] We’ve been partaking of DoorDash and a local food delivery service since Dad got sick because quarantining while cooking is hard. Parishioners have promised food and chicken soup. I don’t really have an appetite though.

[+] What is this variant like? Well, it’s like a head cold, post-nasal drip, and a chest cold went speed-dating. I’m having to write down when I take meds so I don’t take anything that interacts. I’ve gotta say… if this is the mild version that vaxxed people get, I’d hate to have gotten the variant that was out there before the vaccines were developed!

[+] Just pray for me, y’all. I can’t sleep and it feels like I just tried to run through a brick wall.

Catching Up: New Year’s Eve 2023 Edition

Posted on by

Wow. Where to start…

[+] Offline. Both of my parents have had health issues in the last 6 weeks with my dad actually being in the hospital for a couple of days at one point. I voluntold my brother to help me with stockings, and I think we did a good job? It’s been stressy to say the least.

[+] Snow. We finally got hit by a snowstorm in Mount Vernon with all the other storms bypassing us. We only got 5-6 inches at our house, but Bellingham got a foot or more of it. Seattle iced over, and TikTok was full of videos of people attempting to drive in it. I did something to my right hand (which is my seriously dominant hand) shoveling and clearing paths, and it’s getting aggravated almost daily because I can’t not use it.

[+] Wow. I found out that my Aunt Muggs passed away yesterday at age 104. She had been a widow for 31 years, so I think she was probably happy to be reunited with her husband. I only met him twice before he passed away, but they were very positive memories. I’ve been keeping up with Muggs through Christmas cards for years, and my parents used to go visit her when they’d be up in Washington visiting my grandma. They went to her 100th birthday 4 1/2 years ago, and I started getting to know her granddaughter who is around my age this year. She was my paternal grandmother’s sister, and she was the last of that generation left on both sides of my family. It’s 3 1/2-4 hours to where she lives on roads that are probably still snowy, so we most likely won’t make her funeral mass.

[+] Word of the Year. I did Jen Fulwiler’s Word of the Year generator and got steadfast. Given that my word for 2020 was “build” and I built a lot of framework for my church to do worship online, I’m kind of nervous about what that means for me this year.

[+] Saint Generator. I did Jen Fulwiler’s Saint’s Name Generator and got Ignatius of Antioch. He’s the patron saint against throat diseases, of the church in the eastern Mediterranean, and the church in North Africa. Does this mean thyroid issues or me bonding with the Coptic church more? Am I going to become Antiochian Orthodox?

[+] Resolutions. I think I’ll work on 2020’s resolutions again.

Catching Up: May 20, 2022 Edition

Posted on by

Let’s go!

[+] For those who want to know about life in Russia these days, Youtuber Eli from Russia has posted a bit. YouTube will give you other suggestions based on her.

[+] I finished Legends & Lattes on Monday and the book ended up growing on me. I started Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, and I finished the first book as well on Monday. It should be interesting to see how the series shapes up.

[+] WIth the USA hitting the milestone of 1 million COVID deaths, the New York Times asked for people to submit last texts from their loved ones who died. The results are here.

[+] The formula shortage is unnerving to those of us who couldn’t breastfeed. I was simply too sick. They were concerned about the toll the PTSD and PPD took on my recovery from the HELLP Syndrome, and the lack of sleep from having to wake up to pump was messing with me pretty badly. My kid survived on Neosure for 9 months and then Similac Advance. He went into failure to thrive when an idiot WIC nutritionist made me take him off of formula. He ended up on medical grade Pediasure when we moved up to northern California.

The other issue? Women that couldn’t breastfeed are catching fire from people who don’t quite get that there are legitimate reasons not to and that our bodies don’t just spontaneously start lactating on demand.

[+] My 42nd birthday was yesterday. My twin brother was up for some hangout time (and also 24 hours free of parenting and potty-training), so that was cool. The coughing spasm that night that caused me to lose my entire dinner on my bed was NOT cool. Thankfully, I do have spare sheets, so I got my bed remade after showering. (It took a few tries to get the smell of the puke out of my sheets today though)

7 Quick Takes: COVID Boosters and Fatigue Edition

Posted on by

7 Quick Takes at MyDomesticChurch.Com

— 1 —

Daniel Shot #1. I realized around Christmas that I had completely forgotten to get Daniel his flu shot. I figured that I’d call and get him an ADHD appointment after Christmas and do it then… except that his pediatrician had no openings until around January 20th. So… I called in and was able to get a nurse appointment for yesterday. I was dreading it because we usually need extra help, and last time they put us in the baby room with a rocking chair. (Have you tried giving a shot to a kid in a rocking chair fighting back? The nurse got lucky and stuck him one of the time he rocked by.) Thankfully, we were in a regular exam room this time, so I was able to fold the top part of myself on him and hold his arm still.

— 2 —

Daniel Shot #2. They just lowered the age for COVID boosters to 12, so I had to make an appointment for Daniel to get his. The problem: almost nobody was scheduling for them, so I had to do some looking. Next obstacle: finding a time that worked with my work schedule. It ended up being this afternoon at my local Haggen, and we managed to do it with Daniel on my lap and me bear-hugging him.

— 3 —

Fatigue. After Daniel got his COVID booster and we got our grocery shopping done (because we had the 15-minute wait before leaving to make sure Daniel didn’t have any adverse symptoms and it was something to do during the wait), we got home and put groceries away. I then had to process the 70 lbs of Daniel supplies that had arrived in the past two days… which involves getting it UPSTAIRS to the guest room and Daniel’s closet. Next, I had to haul all the cardboard back downstairs and down to the area by the recyclers where we store it until the biweekly trash day when they take recycling. After I was done, came in, washed my hands, and headed back UPSTAIRS, I somehow had to muster up the energy to shower. I’ve since made/ate dinner, washed my prep and dinner dishes, and headed upstairs, and I’m in a dark room waiting for Daniel to go to sleep so I can feed him and then go to sleep myself. I’ve forgotten how exhausting it is to have to restrain my kid for shots, especially now that he is as tall as I am and my legs are almost too short to wrap around his!

— 4 —

Beautiful. Disturbed’s cover of “The Sound of Silence” came out 6 years ago, but it is still stunningly beautiful in my opinion, especially the video.

— 5 —

An interesting Tuesday. I got almost no sleep on Monday night, so I thought Tuesday was going to be… interesting. I walked into the drop-in room to find the tables rearranged and my friend Kim (who is the closest friend I have in Washington) doing something Calculus-looking on the board for a bunch of young male students. (They turned out to be engineering students.) There are times when you sit down, shut up, and listen, and this was one of those occasions, especially as Kim explained that she had done all the table Tetris things during the first hour of her shift. I was pretty speechless anyway, so I just busied myself with putting the sign-up sheet for my church’s Lenten devotional book writers together as well as polishing the ask letter.

— 6 —

Last weekend. There were no Quick Takes last weekend due to my parents celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary on Saturday. I posted a few of the pictures from their wedding album on Facebook, and a few people couldn’t believe that they weren’t pictures of me, especially as my hair is currently as long as Mom’s was when she got married. I had to send over a few pictures from MY wedding to prove that it wasn’t me in my parents’ wedding pictures!

Anyway, they didn’t want a big party (not just due to COVID but because it’s not what they’re into), so my evil twin’s family came up overnight for dinner and a nice breakfast. I had fun chasing my 3 1/2 year old nephew Braden around the house. 🙂

— 7 —

Betty White. I wanted to remind everyone that Monday is the Betty White challenge where people are encouraged to donate to their favorite animal shelter or rescue in her name. If you need a place to donate to, I highly recommend the Wildcat Sanctuary in Minnesota. I sponsor two of their hybrids Love and Riku, and they’re rescuing a serval named Bruno in Massachusetts who just had to have one of his hind legs amputated.

This is Love being a chatterbox:

For more Quick Takes, go visit our host Elena of My Domestic Church.

7 Quick Takes: New Year Edition

Posted on by

7 Quick Takes at MyDomesticChurch.Com

— 1 —

Word of the Year. I did Jen Fulwiler’s Word of the Year Generator and got “dazzle”. I’m a pretty plain person, so this should be interesting.

— 2 —

Saint of the Year. I did Jen Fulwiler’s Saint’s Name Generator and got St. Clotilde, who is the patron saint of adopted children, brides, disappointing children, exiles, parenthood, parents of large families, queens and widows.

I first encountered Clotilde in my Medieval Europe class in college, and the history nerd in me is happy that I got her.

— 3 —

Christmas. My brother and his family were up here for Christmas, so that was fun. His son Braden is cute, and they introduced us to the “Into the Spider-Verse” movie.

— 4 —

Mental health. I had a breakdown by myself for 5 hours on Christmas morning. I had somehow missed my meds on Christmas Eve, so that didn’t help, but I somehow hit a grief well of grief for Grandpa. I was trying to finish Mom’s socks, and it was taken a bit longer due to not being able to read the pattern because I was crying so hard. I was trying to get back to sleep when Daniel kicked off around 5, and I had to keep him silent while people slept. I had taken some Ativan, but that was doing nothing for me. It was a brutal night.

Things hit me again a few days later, and it thankfully gave me something to talk about with my therapist. We’re working through it, but there’s a lot to unpack.

— 5 —

New Year’s Eve. I celebrated New Year’s Eve in my jammies putting my new bullet journal together. I went against my own rules at midnight and had an inch of Prosecco, which was underwhelming. (One of the reasons I don’t drink is that I really don’t like wine or beer.) I then went on the Best Buy website and browsed for a new laptop.

— 6 —

Laptop is here!!!! I ordered the laptop yesterday and opted to pay the extra $6 to get it today. Well, I was downstairs last night putting Daniel’s pills in the china cabinet, and the delivery truck was in the driveway. Mom got a picture of me petting it.

My preciousssssss!

I’ll be setting it up today.

— 7 —

New Year’s resolutions. I’ve decided to just redo my 2020 intentions. I’ll let you know how it all goes.

For more Quick Takes, go visit our host Elena of My Domestic Church.

7 Quick Takes: Spooky Cat Edition

Posted on by

7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Introductions. This is Doc. He is the new cat in town.

My spooky kitty cat

— 2 —

How he came to Casa Meditatio. Mom needed a buddy after losing Jethro, so I started looking on rescue sites to try and find an appropriate cat for her. I was at the vet last Friday picking up the bag with Jethro’s box in it (along with a paw print, some fur in a ziploc bag, a sympathy card, and certificate of cremation), and there was a beautiful and sociable tabby cat with mittens in the adoption enclosure. I excitedly called Mom to say that I might have a cat for her… only to find out that this ridiculously social cat hates other cats, meaning that she was a no-go. I fought back tears the entire way home because I had fallen in love with her the second I met her.

When I got home (and had a good cry), I looked online at various rescues and saw this beautiful tabby cat with soulful eyes on the website of the NOAH Center, a local rescue that does low-cost spays/neuters and also helps to adopt out shelter cats that are having a hard time getting adopted. I called them and asked some questions about him. They told me that he seemed to be OK with other cats, that he liked to burrow under blankets, and was just a lovebug. I fell in love with him at that point, and Mom did too when she went to the NOAH Center on Monday. He rubbed her hands and purred for her when she reached into his enclosure, and she brought him home.

— 3 —

Spooky boy. When I called the NOAH Center to make sure he was still adoptable on Monday, they told me to have a sanctuary room prepped for him because he would need to decompress for 72 hours or so, especially as the shelter experience had been hard on him. We set up the guest room for him, and he has been enjoying its amenities, most notably the underside of the bed. He got a bit hissy when we got him home, and he is definitely a bit spooky right now.

— 4 —

Socializing Mr. Spooky. My mom has spent time in the guest room having her breakfast and watching a lecture on Beethoven with him in there. I’ve spent a couple of hours every evening since Monday lying on a fleece blanket on the floor working on my laptop to help him get used to my presence. I started reading to him last night, and he seems to be chill for that. He will actually go to sleep while I’m reading and he is at the point where he’ll come out from under the bed to eat or use his litter box with me in the room.

He also likes to burrow and Mom has found him under one of the fleece blankets with his little face poking out, and he burrowed into one of the comforters on the bed on Thursday morning. I walked in to check on him and found Mom stroking a lump in the bed. 🙂

— 5 —

A wrench in the plan. The NOAH Center called us on Tuesday morning to let us know that Doc was on antibiotics for a cold and that they had forgotten to send them home with him. Mom and Dad went and got them, and we had to extract Doc from under the bed to medicate him. We really hate doing it because it makes Doc more scared, but we’ve done it daily since Tuesday, and today (Friday) is thankfully the last day.

When I extracted him on Wednesday, I was holding him to me and petting him while telling him that he is loved, he is safe, he has beautiful stripes, and his yellow eyes are soulful. Each day has gotten a little easier, but we still hate doing it. (The antibiotic is also stinky and the smell stays on my hands all day, so I’ll be happy to be done today.)

— 6 —

Progress. Today, I went into the guest room to switch out books this afternoon, and I decided to check on him. He was next to the lamp table (12 inches from me), so I lay down on the floor next to him and put out my fingers. He sniffed them, and I decided to see if he would let me pet his tail. He allowed it as well as letting me pet his little feet. He finally touched his nose to my fingers, and I feel so incredibly special.

— 7 —

Minion’s reaction. The prince of darkness knows something is up, has been sniffing at the door and puffing up, and is perturbed that there is food in HIS guest room that he is not being allowed to have. (I should point out that he has several food stations in the house, but he is of the opinion that stolen food is best.) I’ve been trying to give my incorrigible monster extra attention, but we’re expecting fireworks when he eventually meets Doc. Please pray that their eventual meeting is mostly positive.

For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.